Pentax Question

My father-in-law gave me a Pentax KS SuperII. The mirror was in the up position, and the shutter won't release. I took it to a camera shop, and they tried a new battery, and checked that the shutter leaves weren't snagged up. The film advance also will not move. Does anyone know why this might be hung up like this?

Shop rate for working on a camera here is $68. That's a lot of money for a camera that's worth about $100 in working order. So if it's a simple thing, I've got a buddy, with a little bit of experience working on Nikons, I can get to help me repair it.

Thanks.

CLEAN THE BATTERY CONTACTS!!!!! pencil erasers work fine

not knowing the camera though, i suspect that the battery does nill for the above mentioned problems though :mad:

if you have no clear and definite answer... i can put out a few calls for you

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Originally Posted by paulnj

CLEAN THE BATTERY CONTACTS!!!!! pencil erasers work fine

not knowing the camera though, i suspect that the battery does nill for the above mentioned problems though :mad:

if you have no clear and definite answer... i can put out a few calls for you

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I should have thought of cleaning the contacts! I'll try it tonight and let you know if that does it. The guy at ASAP photo said it is a battery dependant camera. The battery is required to fire the shutter. I'd like to fix this one and trade it in on a K1000 for astrophotography and night shots. The KS doesn't even have a bulb setting!

Thanks for the help my friend!

As far as the mirror being in the up position it may just be a matter of some basic cleaning depending on what conditions he kept it stored under...

just from my "fun" experiences with my K1000...I don't know anything about the one your talking about but it seems similar in issues. here's my half a penny

P.S. when you say the film advance do you mean the counter or the actual piece that advances...because every so often mine(advance handle) gets "stuck" to the right and it takes fiddling with the handle and with the shutter buttton to get it to click in place and it works fine again and the counter hasn't worked for abou three years and I just keep track of the shots

Quote:

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Originally Posted by natatbeach

As far as the mirror being in the up position it may just be a matter of some basic cleaning depending on what conditions he kept it stored under...

just from my "fun" experiences with my K1000...I don't know anything about the one your talking about but it seems similar in issues. here's my half a penny

P.S. when you say the film advance do you mean the counter or the actual piece that advances...because every so often mine(advance handle) gets "stuck" to the right and it takes fiddling with the handle and with the shutter buttton to get it to click in place and it works fine again and the counter hasn't worked for abou three years and I just keep track of the shots

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I've played with the camera some since I posted this. By film advance, I do mean the lever that advances the film. I took the bottom plate off the camera, and I found the remains of a plastic bushing, so I think I found what is causing the problem. I didn't have access to the inside, and I was hesitant to take it apart any further without some instructions. I'll see if my buddy feels confident enough to disassemble it further. If so, we'
ll see if we can find where the bushing came from and get a replacement.

I taught a class at the local community college this past Saturday, and when I get my check for that, I'm going to get a K1000. I can't bring myself to use my N80 for long exposures since it's battery dependant. With the K1000, I can lock the shutter open, set my timer, and not worry about batteries dying on me and cutting my shot short. I want to take some night shots, and some long exposure astro-photography shots, and the K1000 should fill the bill quite nicely.

Of course the wife is giving me hell about buying a K1000. She said if I wanted to "learn" photography, then I should get a K1000. I opted for the N80. It had the options/controls that I knew I would want, and the ability to expand with my experience. Now that it's come full circle, Dawn is telling me "I told you to get a K1000 to start with."

Thanks for you input Nat. I appreciate the info. Hope you have a great day!

"yes honey---you were right and I was wrong. How could I have been so stupid?"

he he just kidding--- but really listened to your wife more often :D

Glad you worked it out.... my old dinosaur was what I learned on If only I could remember what I learned ..

take care

A K1000 is definately a better choice for long exposures than anything like an N80 because of the batteries - long exposure here meaning a few minutes or more. Although a K1000 is a great camera (hey, it's what I started on!), how about a Nikon FM so you can use the lenses you already have? You should be able to find a decent used FM for $100 or so, and in features it's pretty similar to the K1000.

One nice thing about the FM and other cameras of that series is that is has a (sort of) mirror lock-up. Once you start the self timer, the first thing that happens is that the mirror locks up. This could be handy too.